


Ships That Pass

by haunt_the_stars



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, Character Study, Coming Out, Implied Sexual Content, Internalized Homophobia, Jet (Avatar) is not a terrible person, M/M, Sort Of, The inherent homoeroticism of a ferry meeting, Zuko (Avatar) is not a terrible person, are they terrible for each other? jury’s out, fade to black sexual content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-27
Updated: 2020-12-27
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:55:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,074
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28362030
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/haunt_the_stars/pseuds/haunt_the_stars
Summary: Lee is not Fire Nation, not royal, not Fire Nation— Zuko doesn’t know what they do to people like that in the Earth Kingdom but Lee doesn’t care.Jet tastes like freedom./or, the inherent tragedy and homoeroticism of a fleeting ferry romance
Relationships: Iroh & Zuko (Avatar), Jet/Zuko (Avatar), Sokka & Zuko (Avatar)
Comments: 15
Kudos: 122





	Ships That Pass

**Author's Note:**

> heyyy i haven’t posted in like a year and a half and there’s a pandemic and aaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
> 
> if any of you follow me for haunt_the_stars brand dick grayson whump, i can’t promise anything soon but i do still love DC and still have things in the works. i’ve been distracted by atla renaissance and slowly working on this for 6 months.
> 
> Some notes on this fic:
> 
> 1.) I’ve slightly altered a few canon scenes (mostly timing stuff) because I wrote some scenes before going back to rewatch the episodes lol
> 
> 2.) I had no idea whether it’s spelled Li or Lee but the wiki says Lee so I went with that.
> 
> 3.) There is no explicit content in this fic, just a fade-to-black scene you can interpret however you please
> 
> ok that’s it thank you

“As soon as I saw your scar, I knew exactly who you were—“

—and Zuko’s heart plummets through his ribs. He had murmured to Uncle, as they approached that first Earth Kingdom village what feels like forever ago, a shake in his voice, “what if they know my...” 

Uncle had said, just as quiet, the hand on his back firm, “they will know where it came from, and we must let them assume the rest.” His face was sullen and hard, and the squeeze on Zuko’s shoulder said _I’m sorry,_ and the scar had never been anything but a painful, painful _shameful_ reminder, much less a tool of manipulation, but.

But Zuko, well, maybe he’s been that before.

He didn’t want to think about that, so he... just didn’t. Song was the first person to look over fake names and an even faker story out of pity, because of _it_ , and she wasn’t the last.

But Jet is too smart. Has to be, because things don’t go... like this. Not for Zuko. 

Uncle was wrong. There are no second chances when his first is written on his face.

“—you’re an outcast, like me.”

—and Zuko’s heart thuds back into place, leaving him lightheaded. It doesn’t quite start beating right again.

“And us outcasts have to stick together. We have to watch each other’s backs, because no one else will.” It’s a nice sentiment. Probably the nicest sentiment someone has expressed to Zuko in...

In a longer time than he wants to admit.

He’s still reeling from the comment about his scar but he thinks on Jet’s words for a second, tries to think about what someone besides Uncle watching his back would mean. He didn’t mean it literally— even Zuko knows _that_ — but he thinks about how Jet unknowingly ended up to his left for most of their sneaking around, how he flinched when he felt movement in his blind spot and then relaxed when he realized he didn’t have to keep checking it. He wants to say _yes, please, be on my side and I’ll be on yours_ but it feels too vulnerable to even turn his head and look at Jet. He fixes his eyes on the horizon and chooses his words carefully, the way he was taught. “I’ve realized lately that being on your own isn’t always the best path.”

He hopes it’s enough of an open door.

“I have my Freedom Fighters. But it’s...” Jet glances at him, and his tongue darts out to wet his lips. “Well, it’s different when you meet someone who really understands you.” 

Zuko might just throw up.

“I haven’t met anyone like that before,” he says. Jet’s fingertips are probably an inch away from his on the railing. He’s almost certainly misreading the situation, because he always does, but he doesn’t even know if he wants to be wrong or not.

Jet tilts his head up at the sky, a more serious expression clouding his eyes. “When you’ve been through a lot of shit it’s harder to find people who understand.”

“It’s lonely,” Zuko says, barely above a whisper. The air between them feels fragile. He doesn’t have a good track record with fragile things.

“Yeah.” Jet looks back at him, shifts his fingers across that fragile, astronomical inch. Wraps Zuko’s hand in his and squeezes, then— stays. “It is.”

Jet doesn’t pull his hand away. Zuko doesn’t panic.

Maybe a little.

He freezes, the way he always used to when he fucked up at home, but Jet moves his whole body closer, so now their arms are just touching. “You know, you’re right about one thing, Lee.” He smiles like a tiger shark, all sharp teeth and Zuko thinks— completely unprompted, unexpected, unwanted— about them on his neck. “You don’t have to be alone anymore.”

—and he’s sure he’s not misreading anymore.

There’s something about... about a hand in his, about someone his age, about the thoughts he can’t seem to get out of his head of _have me want me take me_ — that makes him angry. Hot, boiling, deep-in-his-bones rage. Lee doesn’t have to be alone, but.

But Zuko did.

Ty Lee was never cruel, and Mai liked him, apparently. But they weren’t his friends, and it didn’t even matter if they were. He hasn’t seen them in three years, hasn’t seen _anyone_ in three years, maybe will never see them again. He hasn’t thought about anyone besides the Avatar, the Avatar, Uncle, the Avatar, Azula Father Father Father Father—

—in three years.

He’s never getting those years back.

It’s stupidly simple, to stand with someone his age and have his hand held and be stupidly breathless at the feeling in his veins. But it’s something that was stolen from him, one thing among everything else that Father had to know he wouldn’t get to have. And he’s _angry._

Jet’s still smiling, but his eyes are wandering over Zuko’s face, searching for something, never stopping or skipping at the scar the way most people do. Zuko’s angry, and Jet is an enemy of his nation, far below his rank, and very, extremely, undeniably male.

Lee is not Fire Nation, not royal, _not Fire Nation_ — Zuko doesn’t know what they do to _people like that_ in the Earth Kingdom but Lee doesn’t care.

Jet tastes like freedom.

For all that he’s falling apart inside, the fake name and the refugee cover and the realization that he’s had a life taken away from him, it’s a good first kiss. Father would kill him if he knew, and that should terrify him. It just makes it taste sweeter.

Jet’s free hand rests on the back of his head, where the layer of fuzz is growing into something messier, and pushes them deeper together. Zuko has to lean up just a little bit to meet him and it makes his legs feel weak in a way that can’t be chalked up to being young and emotional and lonely. It’s not the first time this particular personal crisis has escaped from the box locked deep in the back of his mind, but now he has Jet and his fantasies of justice and revenge swimming in his head and suddenly it’s his own perfect little slice of revolution. He doesn’t _want_ to push it down again.

Jet pulls away while Zuko is floating somewhere outside his body. He’s still holding Zuko’s hand and looks wholly unchanged from fifteen seconds ago. Zuko feels like maybe the world just shattered beneath him and came back together while his eyes were closed.

“Come with me?” Jet murmurs, and Zuko just nods. He would follow Jet to the end of the earth if he asked right now. The trance breaks when Jet lets go of him and starts to walk away, and the ferry and the people come back into focus, but it doesn’t seem like anybody’s seen them. Zuko is relieved. Lee doesn’t care.

He follows Jet to the interior of the boat, footsteps light to match his. It’s almost like their little mission earlier, except then Jet’s opening a door and Zuko’s being yanked in by the front of his shirt and shoved against the wall of a closet and kissed with much more teeth and tongue than back on the deck.

Lee doesn’t care.

“You ever been with a guy before?” Jet says against his lips.

“No.” Zuko doesn’t clarify that he’s never really been with anyone before. He’s never thought about being with anyone before. Never thought about doing things, normal things like this at all because—

Jet bites his lower lip, and he doesn’t have to think about that anymore. 

He’s not really sure what to do with his hands, so he rests them on Jet’s shoulders, and eventually locks his fingers together around his neck. Jet’s hands are everywhere, first, and then they’re on his hips, his grip nearly bruising.

There’s nothing gentle about it, but Zuko doesn’t think he would have known what to do with gentle, anyway. He wonders if Jet’s been with guys before, if this is how he kisses all kinds of guys or if this is just for—

“ _Lee_.” The way Jet makes such a plain, standard _not-his_ name sound like a prayer as he kisses his jawbone is a little bit the most wonderful thing he’s ever heard. And Jet must notice him shudder— maybe feels his throat constrict since his lips are _right there_ — because he says it again, and again, and again.

Lee pulls him closer, closes his eyes, and thinks about nothing else.

~ ~ ~ 

Later, Jet grabs his sweaty hand as he turns to leave the closet and tugs him back, presses their lips together one last time. It’s a little gentler this time, and Lee doesn’t know what to do with it, but he knows if he never opens his eyes he’ll never have to think about it.

Jet’s hand is on his shoulder, and then it’s hovering next to his face and Jet’s whispering, “Would it bother you if I touched it?”

The reminder of who he is and where he is and why he’s here is devastating, but not as heavy as the realization that he’d _forgotten about it_ , just for a little while. For the very first time, he’d just. Forgotten about it.

Nobody’s touched it since it scarred over. He hardly touches it himself. The nerves are gone, so he wouldn’t be able to feel it if he did, and.

And it gets hard to breathe, sometimes. If he touches it.

But nobody’s ever asked to touch it either, because people generally look at him at an angle and try to pretend it isn’t there, the way he will never be able to do. They look at his right ear when he talks to them, and he _knows_ eye contact isn’t disrespectful outside of the Fire Nation.

Father must have known that part, too. That no one would want to look at him, touch him, love him ever again. That he would be dirty and ruined.

But Jet made eye contact with him, real eye contact like he hadn’t had in years, and Jet touched him like he was something to be _wanted_.

So Zuko shakes his head a tiny bit, and Jet cups his face, his right hand almost covering the whole scar. With his hair like this, Jet can’t see the fingertip shapes behind his ear, but he still splays his hand out the same way and it leaves Zuko breathless. 

Jet’s not hurting him. 

He could, if he wanted to, but he’s not. It’s terrifying, or thrilling, or maybe both.

Zuko initiates the kiss again this time, tries to memorize the feeling.

“We don’t have to hurt anymore,” Jet says. “You don’t have to hurt anymore.” 

Zuko believes him.

~ ~ ~

Uncle watches him with a weird look when he comes back to sleep, and he remembers why he keeps things in that little box in his head. Uncle may not be his father, but he’s Fire Nation all the same.

They _burn_ people like him in the Fire Nation.

_Stupid, stupid, stupid._

Uncle doesn’t say anything, and he eventually does fall asleep. The rocking of the boat is familiar enough.

~ ~ ~

He wakes up with Jet’s name on his lips, and Father’s hot iron grip on his heart. Uncle is awake already, but he only spares Zuko a glance as he grasps at his chest and tries to catch his breath as quietly as possible. It’s not like it’s anything unusual.

He doesn’t remember the dream, but it’s left him shaking and exhausted, and he knows it’s because of what he did last night. His brain reminding his battered heart that he’s not supposed to do things like that, isn’t allowed, doesn’t _deserve—_

He eats some leftover food with Uncle, and doesn’t look for Jet. He tries not to be too twitchy as they disembark so Uncle won’t somehow figure out what’s going on. He tries to push the whole night into the box in his head and lock it away, but the bruises on his collarbone feel like they’re burning beneath his clothes. He doesn’t look for Jet.

Of course, Jet isn’t going to let him get away with that.

“So.”

Zuko turns, finds Jet sitting way too close to him for comfort with Uncle right there. So much for forgetting.

“You guys got any plans for once you’re inside the city?”

Thank the spirits for the tea cart that distracts Uncle, because Zuko absolutely cannot sit here between him and a guy who just last night had his tongue down his throat and make casual conversation. Actually, he can’t sit here with a guy who had his tongue down his throat at all because it’s _illegal_ and _wrong_ and _Agni, if anyone found out—_

“Hey, can I talk to you for a second?” Jet tilts his head and gets up without waiting for an answer. Not that he needs to. Zuko sighs, wills himself not to do anything else stupid, and follows.

“You and I have a much better chance of making it in the city if we stick together,” Jet says, and well, that’s one way to put it. There’s something small and pathetic and needy inside Zuko that glows at the thought of _sticking together_ , at the notion that someone wants to... well, _wants_ him.

And there’s something larger, something that has managed to keep him alive year after damned year, that remembers the little boy Lee, who wanted him and then didn’t, and Mother who wanted him but not enough, and Father who never wanted him at all, maybe, possibly, probably. If Jet looks at him in the light he’ll see something he doesn’t want. Zuko doesn’t want to wait for it.

“You wanna join the Freedom Fighters?” Jet smiles, and unspoken, in his expression— or maybe Zuko’s imagining things— _do you want to do that again?_

“Thanks, but I don’t think you want me in your gang,” he forces out past the _yes_ sitting heavy on his tongue.

Jet doesn’t want to make it easy for him. “Come on, we made a great team—“ _making out in a closet?_ “—looting that captain’s food. Think of all the good we could do for these refugees.”

Zuko can’t pretend the look in Jet’s eyes when he talks about _doing good_ isn’t maddeningly enticing, so he tears his gaze away instead. “I said no.” It leaves him feeling hollow.

One more look. He can look back at him once, just to remember. Jet looks— upset.

He doesn’t really have time to think about it, because Uncle firebent his fucking tea and now he’s stuck thinking about crushed hands or worse, and he just sort of. Forgets.

For a little while.

~ ~ ~

The city drowns him and wrings him out until he doesn’t know what’s left, and working doesn’t help. He thinks about Father, still, thinks about Azula but mostly he thinks about tea, and Uncle, and not blowing their cover. 

He almost thinks about Jet, sometimes, but he can’t think about Jet, so he doesn’t. If he thinks about Jet, he’ll start wanting things, and it’ll only end up hurting when he can’t have them.

The walls suffocate him. There’s something _wrong_ here; he can’t explain it but he _knows_ it. Uncle says he just needs time to settle down. Zuko doesn’t want to settle down.

It’s weeks before he sees Jet, hanging around the corner from the shop like he’s waiting for something. Zuko’s pathetic little heart jackalopes in his chest at the sight of him and he stops in his tracks, thankful he worked later than Uncle tonight, embarrassed at how Jet only needed one night with him to make him feel this way, relieved to see someone who might understand how freaked out he is here, terrified of being rejected after he essentially ran away at the ferry station.

Luckily, Jet looks up at the sound of his footsteps, and all those feelings go out the window. The only thing Zuko can think about is the way his lips felt.

Jet’s eyes narrow for a second in an emotion Zuko can’t place, or maybe one he doesn’t want to. But then his face smoothes out into a smile, and against all the heaviness in him, Zuko smiles back.

“Hey, baby,” Jet says, and Zuko—

Zuko stops functioning.

Just for a moment.

He swallows, his mouth suddenly painfully dry, and manages a “Hey.”

“I wanted to see you again.” He looks Zuko up and down, eyes dragging over his body slowly and visibly. Zuko thinks about asking him if he’s noticed how everything seems an inch _off_ here, but even in the low light he feels like the streets can hear him, and he’s a little distracted by the way Jet is looking at him.

If Jet sees his unease, he doesn’t mention it. He puts his hand on Zuko’s hip and leans close to him, but when Zuko tries to kiss him, he draws back.

“Where are you from, Lee?” Jet asks quietly, casually, like he’s not two inches from Zuko’s face and holding him around the waist. Zuko doesn’t know why he’s asking, and nearly assumes the worst, but. But Jet’s holding him, and Zuko hasn’t really talked to someone who doesn’t want him dead in a long time, so he doesn’t really know how it goes. He must have done something wrong, but he can’t puzzle it out, especially now that he has to lie. 

_The best lies have the most truth to them_ , Uncle would say. Azula would say _you couldn’t lie to save your life, dum-dum_. “A village,” he says. _Lie_. “Far away from here.” _Truth_.

Jet hums, brings his hand up to brush his thumb over Zuko’s lips. “Your eyes. They’re pretty.” Zuko swallows, pleased but uncomfortable with the compliment and confused at the change of subject. He doesn’t want to talk. Talking is when he fucks up. He leans in again, and again Jet tilts his head away. “Are they gold?”

“They’re brown.” _Lie_. “But they look lighter sometimes.” _Lie_. “And...” _And_. “...and one of them doesn’t really work anymore, so. It’s lighter.” _Truth_.

Jet’s shoulders fall a little bit. He’s acting weird, weird like this city is weird and Zuko hates that he can’t read people and desperately wants Jet to go back to body language he can understand like teeth to his throat and nails in his hip.

“I’m sorry,” Jet whispers, trailing his hand down Zuko’s arm and looking a little bit devastated. Zuko opens his mouth to ask why he’s apologizing, but then Jet’s lips are on his and he forgets that he was going to say anything at all. 

It’s almost romantic, this time. Deep and slow and maybe Zuko can settle down after all, if this is what it could be. Maybe he can give up firebending forever, maybe he could walk himself right off a cliff if it was for this. For him.

Jet pulls away abruptly, and Zuko startles. He looks behind him, but the street is empty.

“I’m sorry, Lee,” Jet says again. He’s gone before Zuko turns back around.

~ ~ ~

He doesn’t see Jet the next day, and he’d be lying if he were to say it doesn’t hurt. Not that it’s unexpected. Not that he didn’t know this is what would happen. Not that this wasn’t why he denied him in the first place.

But. It still hurts.

Uncle even asks him what’s wrong, why he’s moping and messing up orders, and he has to make some excuse about being tired before he goes back to thinking over the strange meeting from yesterday. He still doesn’t understand what exactly happened. Why Jet was waiting for him. Why he walked away. Why he asked those questions, like he _knew_.

He can’t know. He wouldn’t have kissed him like that, if he knew.

He’s picking the same tray up for the third time, thinking about Jet calling him _baby_ , when the door slams open.

“I’m tired of waiting!”

Zuko startles, and turns to lock eyes with— with—

_Oh_.

Jet knows.

His eyes are dark and flashing with something Zuko hasn’t seen since he left the Fire Nation.

“These two men are firebenders!”

Against his best efforts, Zuko shudders when Jet draws his weapons and slashes them in front of him with a vigor that says _I am not in control right now_. Zuko knows what that looks like. He just didn’t expect to see it from Jet. 

He stays rooted in place, jaw clamped shut, and waits to see what Uncle does. He can’t blow this. Maybe for himself, but not for Uncle, and certainly not because of his stupid, illicit _feelings_.

Someone tells Jet to stand down, and Jet doesn’t. He comes closer, leering and dangerous, any fondness he ever had for Zuko gone. No trace left behind.

“You’ll have to defend yourself. Then everyone will know.” He’s speaking straight to Zuko, smiling in that way that still makes his heart stutter, except it’s all _wrong_ now. “Go ahead. Show them what you can do.”

Zuko breathes. He never refuses to fight. At least, not anymore, not after he was helpless and—

He never refuses to fight. That guy has swords, and he doesn’t need a lick of fire if he has swords.

Zuko breathes, and fights. 

~ ~ ~

He walks home in a daze.

He doesn’t remember arriving at their apartment, or heading straight for his room, but he vaguely remembers slamming the door shut and crumpling to his bed.

He feels sick. It doesn’t make any sense. They didn’t get discovered, they didn’t get arrested. They’re safe. But his chest aches, and his stomach is in knots. The sight of Jet being dragged away, the hatred in his eyes, is repeating over and over in his head.

It shouldn’t bother him, but it does.

Someone he thought was a... not an enemy pulling weapons on him out of nowhere shouldn’t have surprised him, but it did.

He wonders how long Jet knew, and then finds that train of thought almost too painful to follow. He must have known when he asked about his eyes, when he kissed him like he was worth loving. But he could’ve known before that, back on the ferry, the whole time, could have just been trying to fuck with him. And Zuko fell for it, because he always does, because he doesn’t know any better, because no one’s ever treated him like a person before so how was he supposed to know?

He doesn’t really notice he’s crying until he hears himself sniffle. It’s dumb. It’s pathetic, and Azula would say so. Father would— 

Father would—

There’s a knock at his door.

“Zuko?” Uncle must have heard him sobbing into his pillow. “May I come in?”

Zuko doesn’t answer. Uncle is used to this. 

“I’m coming in.” A few seconds of pause, and then the door slides open and the bed dips as Uncle sits down. Zuko keeps himself faced away, curled in on himself, refusing to look at Uncle’s kind, warm eyes because if he does, he’ll start talking. And he can’t do that because if he does, he won’t be able to stop. He’ll tell him everything. And Uncle can’t _know_ because—

_they burn people like him_

_and they both know his skin is very flammable._

Uncle doesn’t say anything for a while, just sits while Zuko holds himself stiffly and bites the tremble out of his lip.

“Have I ever told you about my first heartbreak?” 

Zuko’s breath catches in his throat. Uncle says it easily, like he just wants to tell some stupid story. Like he didn’t just imply—

Like he doesn’t _know—_

_Like he’s not—_

“I was about your age, a little younger, and there was the most beautiful young lady whose family lived near the palace...”

Zuko’s not listening, not really, but Uncle stops speaking at some point, and rests his hand on Zuko’s shoulder.

“It is always hardest the first time, nephew. I am sorry things ended up this way.”

_—like he’s not mad._

~ ~ ~

Zuko chokes when Jet appears on the stage.

It doesn’t look much like him, of course— the wig is cheap, the actor is older and Jet’s abs were... harder. But the outfit, the swords, the stem in his mouth— which doesn’t have the same unbearably attractive effect it had on Jet— are all clearly supposed to be him. 

Of course Aang and everyone had run into Jet, too. Of course he had worked his charm on Katara, too. And of course, Zuko wasn’t special. Katara blushes and Zuko feels stupid and wonders, not for the first time, if Jet even liked guys, even liked _him_. He didn’t think anyone could fake that night on the ferry, but he’s been wrong before. He’s been wrong a lot. 

It’s sometime after the others arrive in Ba Sing Se on stage that Zuko realizes they don’t know. The playwrights didn’t know about the ferry, his... allies don’t know he ever knew Jet. 

Privacy isn’t something he’s ever been allowed to have. Father made sure of that. But the ferry, Jet’s skin against his, the whispers and the awkward maneuvering of their lips until they slotted together just right— that was just for him. As stupid as he feels for holding so tightly to something when he doesn’t even know if it was real, it’s kind of all he has. He doesn’t think about it much anymore, not with everything happening so fast, but sometimes... sometimes when it’s late, he thinks about what couldn’t ever have been. 

And then Jet’s back on the stage.

It’s almost more of a gut-punch than his first appearance was. He didn’t show up to make out with Zuko and he didn’t show up to try and get him arrested, so he doesn’t understand—

_Oh_.

Jet was brainwashed by the Dai Li, which.

Which might be true.

Zuko saw them drag him off. Of course they did something to him, because that city was _evil_ and he _knew that_ and he should’ve _warned_ Jet—

He looks to Aang and Katara, and they’re not reacting with any surprise. At least, he doesn’t think they are. This is true, then.

Zuko feels a little sick.

And then he realizes that he must have been there too, down the hall with Appa, and he feels sicker.

And then Jet dies, and he feels... well, something.

“Did Jet just... die?” he mutters, more to himself than everyone else. 

“Y’know, it was really unclear.”

~ ~ ~

“Hey, are you, uh, okay?” Sokka sits down next to him in the sand, a few feet away.

“I’m fine,” Zuko says.

“Are you?”

Zuko sighs. He really can’t blame Sokka for being nice. “Just still thinking about the play, I guess.”

“The whole ‘people cheering about your death’ thing?” Sokka says. And yeah, maybe that should bother him a bit more, but it’s not anything new. They cheered when he got burned and he was thirteen and not a traitor then, so...

_Not the time._

Zuko drags his fingers through the sand, still preferring to face the waves instead of Sokka. “I was actually, um. Wondering. What you said about Jet, did you mean he really... did he really die?” He spares a glance at Sokka, and sees his face fall, his eyes shifting downward.

“We’re not... really sure. He got hurt, and Katara couldn’t heal him. We left him with his friends so... I don’t know. But he... he was hurt really bad. I don’t think he made it.” Sokka swallows and furrows his brow. “Not to, uh, sound like a jerk, but why do you care?”

“I knew him,” Zuko says quietly, through the numb fog setting in over his mind. “Not. Not very well, but he— we—“ He cuts himself off abruptly, unsure what to call whatever Jet was to him. “We met. In Ba Sing Se,” he decides on.

“Oh. Wow, I... didn’t know that. Were you guys friends?” 

Zuko hesitates far too long before he answers, “Yeah, kinda.”

“Oh.” Zuko doesn’t look at Sokka. He doesn’t want to know if Sokka gets what he’s saying, really doesn’t want to deal with... with that. Not right now. Maybe not ever. “Hey, I’m... I’m really sorry.” A hand drops on his shoulder, squeezing slightly and then falling away. “I can’t say I liked the guy, but he didn’t... he didn’t deserve to die. And I’m sorry you had to find out that way.”

Highly inconveniently, Zuko’s eyes well up. Just a little bit. Sokka won’t see if he keeps his head down. “Yeah,” he whispers. He should shut up now, but they all might die in a week. What does he have to lose? “I guess I always thought maybe... after the war, I could find him again. And apologize. It’s my fault he—“ His voice fails him, stuck in his throat like the unshed tears blurring his vision.

“Hey, no, of course it’s not,” Sokka says quickly, sounding a bit panicked. Zuko flushes, scrubbing his eye.

“It is. He... he got arrested because of me. He found out. And they took him for accusing me.”

“You didn’t know. You couldn’t have known.”

Zuko bites his lip. “I should’ve... done something.”

Sokka sighs, and Zuko looks over to find him tilting his head up, towards the moon. “I get it.” They sit for a few minutes, and Zuko gets lost in the rhythm of the waves and the phantom lips on his jaw. It feels like a lifetime away and yet everything is so vivid. The smell of the ferry, the texture of Jet’s hair, the fabric of his reality bending and breaking after years of thinking he just _deserved to live like that._ The glimpse into an existence he was so sure would never be within his grasp.

_And now, quiet mornings stretching with Aang and swimming with Katara, carrying Toph on his back and sneaking sake with Suki in the dead of night, sword fighting with Sokka with the water lapping over their feet._

_And Jet, gone. Forever._

“I’m gonna head to bed. It’s late,” Sokka says, standing up and brushing the sand off him.

“Goodnight.”

“Goodnight.” Sokka starts to walk back, then stops. “Hey, Zuko? I think he would have liked... the real you. I know we all do.”


End file.
